The Recycled Citizen (22 page)

“Would you believe twenty-seven thousand, nine hundred and forty-six dollars and thirty-two cents? The thirty-two cents was your aunt’s friend, Mrs. Plinth. And Appie bought all the seaweed mottoes.”

“That I can believe. But how wonderful. By the time we sell the Inness landscape and those other things, they’ll have enough to do the whole renovation.”

“Well, maybe. But we’d never have done it tonight without Jem. He was fantastic.”

“You did your share, darling. I saw you up there waving that beaded footstool around. That was why I didn’t call you to help Dolph throw Ted Ashe out.”

“What? When was this?”

“Somewhere around half past nine, I think. He came with Eugene’s fiancée and her parents, the Wilton-Rugges, all dressed up in a lovely suede jacket and calling himself Hetherton Montague.”

“I’ll be damned. So what did you do?”

“Nothing much, actually. Dolph recognized him right away as Ted Ashe and asked why he’d put on those clothes to park cars. Ashe insisted Dolph was mistaken and that he was this other man. I said no, Dolph wasn’t mistaken and he was Wilbraham Winchell. Things began to get sticky, so I shooed the Wilton-Rugges into the auction rooms and was going to get hold of you, but you were asking for a hundred and thirty dollars and it looked as if you were going to get it, so I decided that was no time to interrupt. Did you, by the way?”

“Sarah!”

“Oh, all right. I went back and told Dolph to quiet down, which he did for the moment. Ashe started going on about mistaken identity again, so I told him flat out that we knew who he was and what he was up to. I assumed you or Brooks would already have told Dolph, but either you hadn’t or else it didn’t sink in. Dolph’s isn’t the swiftest brain, you know.”

“I did try to tell him,” said Max, “but he wasn’t listening. I don’t think Dolph’s any dummy, he’s just good at shutting out anything he doesn’t want to hear.”

“If you’d known Great-aunt Matilda, you’d understand why,” Sarah agreed. “I’m not sure he was listening to me, either. He was mostly annoyed because Ashe had turned out to be someone else. Dolph likes things plain and simple, which goodness knows they never were when his aunt and uncle were alive. It was Mr. Loveday who was really shaken about Ashe’s being a reporter.”

“Loveday was there?”

“Yes. That is, he’d gone off to get Aunt Appie and her crowd settled, but he came back while I was straightening Ashe out. I thought he was going to faint when he found out Ashe was a reporter for
Syndicated Slime.
He was all set to help Dolph throw Ashe off the place”— Sarah giggled—“only Mr. Loveday wanted to get his overcoat first, and Dolph wouldn’t wait.”

Max laughed too. “Hell of a job trying to be a hero these days. So Dolph did it alone?”

“Dolph scooted Ashe outside, anyway. I knew George and Walter and Harry Burr were around, so I wasn’t worried. Anyway, Dolph’s bigger than Ashe. I sent Mr. Loveday to quell any curiosity in the other rooms by explaining if he had to that a reporter had gate-crashed and that he and Dolph had thrown the man out. That was a diplomatic touch, don’t you think?”

“Machiavellian. Did you wait to see what happened?”

“No dear, I ran madly to the bathroom. Then I thought I’d rest a minute, and here I am. What’s happening downstairs?”

“The kids are getting their glad rags off and finishing up the food. Mary’s picking up the pieces. Jem’s having a martini. Loveday’s making a pest of himself. You know.”

“What about Aunt Emma?”

“She and her troupe pulled out over an hour ago.”

“And I never even said good-bye. What must she think of me?”

“She thought you were most likely upstairs taking a nap, so she came and looked and you were. She said to kiss you for her and I kissed her for you, so it’s all taken care of.”

“You’re so efficient, dear. I must get up.”

“Mary says you’re welcome to stay the night if you want. Jem and Egbert are staying. I have to take Dolph’s station wagon and ferry that gang into town, but I could come back.”

“You’re not going without me. What if Jem delegates you to kiss those actresses good night for him? Help us up.”

“Are you sure you feel all right?”

“I expect I feel better than you do. You must be exhausted. I wonder if there’s any of that soup left.”

“Let’s go see. I could use some myself.”

That was how Max and Sarah happened to be in the kitchen when George came looking for Dolph.

“Oh God, Mr. Bittersohn, am I glad to see you! Is the boss around?”

“What’s the matter?” Max pulled out a chair. “Here, sit down. Did you hurt yourself? You look like hell.”

“I’m all right, but there’s a dead man in the toolhouse.”

“Are you sure he’s dead?”

“He’s cold, he ain’t breathing, and he’s got a pickax stuck in his chest. That dead enough for you?”

“Plenty. Sarah, I think we’d better call the police. Do you know who the man was, George?”

“No, but that don’t mean anything. There must have been at least three hundred people here tonight I never set eyes on before.”

Sarah found Genevieve’s cooking brandy and poured out a stiff shot for the jittering gardener. “Here, George, drink this. How did you happen to find him?”

“We’d put out ropes on stanchions to keep the cars out of the flower beds, the way we used to when old Mrs. Kelling gave her lawn parties. I’d been going around coiling up the ropes and putting the stanchions together in little piles, the way we always did. Then I thought I’d open the toolhouse so Walter and Harry could get out one of the big garden carts and pick them up to put away. Used to be you could leave things till morning and nobody’d bother them, but not any more. So anyway, I just opened the door and there he was.”

“Did you turn on a light?”

“Sure. The switch is just inside the door. I reached in and flipped it on and—Christ! Where’s the boss?”

“In the ballroom, I think. My wife will find him,” said Max. “Come on, George, we’d better get back there.”

“I don’t want to go back.” Nevertheless George gulped the last of his brandy and hoisted himself out of the chair.

Sarah found the card Genevieve had posted over the telephone, with numbers on it for the fire department, the doctor, the police and, though this last was hardly the sort of thing to inspire one’s confidence in a cook, the hot line to the poison clinic. Sarah dialed the police and gave her message to a cool, matter-of-fact voice at the other end of the line. Somebody, she was assured, would be right over. Then she went to look for Dolph.

In the meantime Max was hurrying George back to the toolhouse. This was no paltry garden shed but a sturdy little one-story building of gray granite blocks trimmed in red brick. A concrete ramp for the carts and mowers led up to a pair of extra wide wooden doors like the ones that used to be put on garages back in the days of the Hupmobile and the Pierce Arrow. A new-looking brass lock held them together.

“Just a second.” George took out a bunch of keys and went to work on the complicated lock. “Got to keep everything locked up nowadays,” he grunted. “Guys-come around with trucks and clean you out if you give ’em half a chance.”

“But you didn’t keep the doors locked this evening?”

“I sure as hell did. So many cars coming and going, all you’d need would be one closed van and whammo! I don’t know whether you realize it, Mr. Bittersohn, but garden equipment’s expensive these days. One riding mower alone could set you back a few thousand bucks depending on what you get. The. boss always wants the best; he says it saves money in the long run. So like I said, I keep everything locked up. So maybe you can tell me how that guy got inside without me knowing?”

“Is this the only way in and out?” Max asked him.

“That’s right,” George confirmed.

“Aren’t there any windows?”

“Two at the back and one on each side, but they’ve got heavy iron grilles bolted over them, right into the bricks.” George gave his key one last turn, pushed open the right-hand door and flipped the light switch without going in, to show Max how he’d done it before. “You look. I don’t want to.”

Max looked and said, “Christ!”

“Do you know who he is, Mr. Bittersohn?”

“Have you ever had a man out here from the SCRC who called himself Ted Ashe?”

“According to Harry Burr, Ashe was supposed to come tonight, but he never showed up. But this is nobody from the SCRC. Look at his clothes.”

“Is Burr still around?”

“Far as I know.”

“Get him, will you?”

Harry Burr couldn’t have been far away. When he came, Max was still standing in the same spot, looking down at the grotesque unreality of a pickax with a heavy ash handle, one tine pointing up at the roof, the other buried in a well cut, neatly buttoned, expensive light brown suede sport jacket. There wasn’t any blood showing, just that deadly sweep of tempered steel.

Max couldn’t see whether the pickax was pinning the body to the floor, but it was standing so stiff and firm that he thought it must be. Ashe was lying quite peacefully on his back. His legs weren’t contorted, his arms were not raised to ward off the blow. His dead face showed no look of horror, but dead faces seldom look anything but dead.

“Go on in, Harry,” he heard George say. “He wants you.”

“I want you, too, George,” Max called out. “And Walter, if he’s around. Stay outside if you want, but don’t go away.”

“We’re all here.” Somewhat shamefaced, George followed Harry Burr into the toolhouse. A third man in denim pants and jacket came after them.

“The police should be along soon,” said Max. “No doubt you’ll have to answer a lot of questions again for them, but humor me, will you? Harry, can you recognize this man? Forget the clothes, just concentrate on the face.”

Harry concentrated, then nodded. “I know him. It’s just that I’d never seen him cleaned up before. He’s a recent member of the SCRC who’s been calling himself Ted Ashe.”

“You never thought that was his actual name?”

“I suspected from the start that Ted was playing a role.”

“Had you any idea why?”

“Not really. At first I hoped he might be a plainclothes policeman trying to get a line on all those bag snatchings our people have been subjected to lately. Somebody seems to be taking too fundamentalistic a view of the text, ‘From him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.’ Perhaps Dolph Kelling has mentioned the muggings to you? You’re a relative of his, I understand?”

“My wife is. Yes, I’ve heard about the trouble you’ve been having. But why do you say at first?”

“Because the snatchings have continued right up through yesterday and Ted hadn’t seemed particularly interested, even when one of our most loyal workers was killed by a mugger. That happened this very week, so you see the situation is steadily worsening. We buried him on Tuesday, and Ted didn’t even attend the funeral service. That wasn’t what made me change my mind, though; it was more what you’d call the final disillusionment. Once I’d got to know him, Ted simply didn’t
feel
like a policeman. That sounds absurd to you, I expect, but then you can’t have been arrested as many times as I have. And am about to be again, I suppose.”

“Why? Did you kill Ted Ashe?”

“No, but I don’t expect the police will believe me. They seldom have in the past. But what a hideous way for anyone to die. Would you mind if I said a little prayer?”

“Go right ahead.”

Max felt ashamed that he hadn’t been thinking of Ashe as a human being with a life to lose but only as a sleazebag who’d most likely set himself up for what he’d got. Nobody deserved to die like this. Nobody had the right to appoint himself another’s executioner. He tried to pay respectful attention to Harry Burr’s prayer but couldn’t help hoping it wouldn’t be a long one. He was damned uneasy about who might have been on the business end of that pickax, and there were some things he wanted to find out before the police got here.

“Who besides yourself has a key to this place?” he asked George as soon as he decently could. “Walter, have you?”

“Not me,” said the other gardener. “The boss has one, of course. I guess old Mr. Kelling did when he was alive, though I can’t remember him ever using it.”

“Me neither,” George put in. “Mr. Kelling never did anything around the place but march along the paths, taking a swat with his cane at any plant that wasn’t growing the way he wanted it to. Us guys had to trail along like we was the privates and he was the general, listening to him tell us all the things we were doing wrong.”

“The boss now,” said Walter, “he’s different. Something goes wrong, he’d just as soon roll up his sleeves and help you fix it. Remember the year of the big blizzard, George, when the ice started to melt and the drains were backing up into the cellar and we couldn’t. get ’em unclogged? The boss grabbed that pickax and—”

Walter became aware of what he was saying and shut up fast.

“Getting back to the keys,” said Max, “aren’t there any more of them around anywhere? What happened to old Mr. Kelling’s key after he died? And shouldn’t there be a master key up at the house? Suppose you’re not around for some reason, George, and Walter has to get into the toolhouse? What does he do?”

“Damned little, from the look of the place when I get back. Aw, I’m only kidding. Walt’s okay. That’s right, Mr. Bittersohn, he’d go up to the house and ask Genevieve to let him take the key off the big board. It’s hanging right beside the kitchen door.”

“Convenient.”

“Yeah. Mr. Kelling liked to keep everything where it could be got hold of in a hurry in case we got invaded by the Martians or whoever. The boss is so used to having the board there, I don’t suppose he ever noticed it’s not the smartest place in the world to keep the keys. Anyway, I don’t suppose he goes into the kitchen much.”

“Besides, I think he still feels funny about changing things around from where his aunt and uncle put them,” Walter added. “I guess I would, too, if I’d been brainwashed all those years like he was. God, it was pitiful. Here’s this great big grown man, old enough to be somebody’s grandfather and the only one of ’em that knew which end he was standing on, and they still bossed him around like he was a little kid. He’d come out to the tennis court and whack balls around to let off steam. The boss had one hell of a forehand. Sometimes you’d think the ball was going right through the backboard.”